January 5 - Nassau, Bahamas

Weather

more north=cooler

– 23º, overcast – glorious for
me, Chris thought it was ‘cold’ – he’s grown accustomed to opening the door in the morning and being hit with a wall of heat and humidity

Steps – 6,733

One final new country to add to my list…today we are in the Bahamas. This brings the total to 79…pretty good.

Today’s visit was a mostly panoramic tour of Nassau. While I prefer a walking tour, panoramic tours cover a lot of ground in a short period of time. Plus, if the guide is good, you can learn plenty about the place –

Bahamian Rum Cake Factory

this guide thought he was hilarious, he was right…some of the time. He definitely gave interesting info.

5 minutes from the port we made a super short stop at Bahama Rum Cake Factory – these cakes are island famous and truly were delicious, not super sweet, and very moist. They were trying to have people buy, but the stop was so short that very few people did.

Atlantis and yachts

Next stop was the mega resort and theme park, Paradise Island. This is the Bahamian Vegas – ritzy, established, commercial, expensive – we always check menu prices…a steak filet was 72USD! The complex around the place had Starbucks, Ben and Jerry’s and many super yachts – not as many as Monte Carlo, but lots. Carven, our guide, told us the most expensive hotel suite on the island was 25,000!

everywhere conch

Our last stop was the John Watlings Distillery. We had a very short tour (8 minutes) of the
rum factory. We saw the bottling process which was entirely by hand. We started with a sample of the best piña colada I have EVER had –

Island coconuts

super creamy, great taste, no ice crystals. We ended with by visiting the bar…we tried a Skylarkin’ and a Bahama Grammy, both were very tasty and a tad strong – no problem taking these on the bus. 

We are back in the land of American prices. The Bahamian dollar is linked to the USD. Our drinks were 9.50USD – we’re not in Brazil anymore.

Skylarkin' and Bahama Grammy

Between stops, we travelled all over Nassau while Carven described what we were seeing and telling us about life here – for one thing, there is no income tax.

Skylarkin'

We decided to wander the area just outside the port and found lunch. We had a couple of rum cocktails and a conch platter…fritters, ceviche, and rice and beans.

The rest of the afternoon was back at the room on

Bahama Grammy

our balcony in the coolish

air watching the constant stre

shot of the balcony for perspective

am of yachts come in, and  contemplating packing.

yachts coming and going